


Revenge of the Gum-Bummed

by William_Easley



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Bonding, Eggbert Elementary School, Elementary School, Family, Photo Day, Tears
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-23
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:00:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 12,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24878836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/William_Easley/pseuds/William_Easley
Summary: Seven-year-old Mabel expects this October day to be the best ever at school--until it's ruined. Dipper steps forward to help, and then the twins must plan their revenge. Set in 2006, way before Dipper and Mabel ever visit Gravity Falls.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 13





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own the show GRAVITY FALLS or the characters of the show. These are the property of Alex Hirsch, the creator of the show, and the Walt Disney Company. I don't earn any money by writing these fanfictions, but just write for fun and practice and in the hope that others enjoy reading them.

* * *

**Revenge of the Gum-Bummed**

**By William Easley**

(October 10-13, 2006)

* * *

1

"Why is it," asked seven-year-old Mabel Pines over her breakfast of strawberry-flavored Krispie Krunchities, toast, and orange juice, "that every time we have a Monday out of school that the weekend has to go so fast?"

"That," her dad, Alex, said with a smile, "is the principle of relativity. Time goes fast when you're having fun. Time slows down when you're sitting in the dentist's waiting room."

"Here's an interesting fact," Mabel said, making a _gah_ face. "After you eat a real sweet cereal orange juice tastes like lemon juice!"

"You don't have to chug it," her dad pointed out.

"More fun this way! Get a big hit of sourness!"

"It's picture day," Dipper said mildly. He was eating a less sweet breakfast—cornflakes and toast, plus half a glass of juice. Mabel enjoyed launching her day with a booster rocket of sugar. Dipper didn't care for stomach aches.

"Do you want me to put your hair in pigtails?" Wanda Pines, Mabel's mom, asked her.

"It's picture day," Dipper repeated since no one seemed to have heard him.

"Yeah, I do!" Mabel said to Mom.

"Then finish eating," Mom told her.

"Don't try to finish too fast, though," Dad said.

Mabel picked up the bowl and poured the rest of her cereal and milk straight into her mouth. "Nomma nom nom, nom, gulp gulp, _done_!" She burped to prove it.

"Say excuse me," Dipper told her.

Mom shook her head. "That wasn't very nice, Mabel. But come upstairs and let me do your hair. And I see you spilled some milk on your shirt. You'll have to change."

Mabel hopped out of her chair. "Can I wear my rainbow top?""

Mother and daughter left the table. Dipper ate the rest of his cereal, glumly.

"What's wrong, son?" Alex asked.

Dipper shrugged. "Aw, I wish you guys would treat Mabel the same as me. If I ate like a pig right out of the bowl and then burped at the table, you'd make me say 'Excuse me.'"

"You're two different people," Alex said with a smile. "You and Mabel have different tastes, you like different things, she's always goofy, you're always serious. You love to read up in your room all by yourself, Mabel loves to go next door and play with Denise and Patsy. You're different, so we treat you a little different, but we love you both."

"But I don't want to be so different. We're _twins_ ," Dipper pointed out. He got up and took his cereal bowl, spoon, and juice glass—and Mabel's too—over to the sink, rinsed them, and put them in the dishwasher. "Sometimes I wish," he began, but trailed off.

Alex brought his and Wanda's coffee cups and dishes over to the sink. "Wish what?"

"Nothing. It's stupid."

"Come on, I won't laugh."

Dipper muttered, "I wish I could be more all-the-time happy like Mabel. I wish I could have friends. Or even just one."

Quietly, Alex said, "Just be yourself, son. And if you want a friend, be a friend. Find some shy kid and help him out with homework. Learn what other kids like and talk to them about it."

"They'd just make fun of me," Dipper said mournfully. _Find_ a shy kid? _He_ was a shy kid!

"Well—hang out with Mabel at school, then," Alex said. "Watch how she does it. You're a fast learner."

"I suppose," Dipper said.

Mom and Mabel came in. Mabel had changed her whole outfit, and she asked, "How do I look, Bro-Dip? Do you like the bows?" She struck a pose, in her pink sneakers, white socks, pink skirt with glittery spangles, paler pink top with a rainbow design, and—two pigtails, tied with pink ribbons. With the backs of her fingers, she floofed the pigtails, making them bounce.

"You look very pink," Dipper told her.

Mom fussed with one of the bows, but said, "Dipper, be sure to wear your jacket and cap. It's cool out this morning, and I'm afraid you're catching cold."

"It's just his allergies," Alex said.

Mabel shook her head to make her pigtails flip. "I'm not allergic!"

"Just wait," Alex teased. "You always get your stuffy nose one day after your brother does. You'll be sneezy tomorrow, and your nose will turn pink."

"But today I'm gorgeous!" Mabel said.

"Get your sweater," Wanda said. "I've packed your lunch boxes. We need to leave in five minutes. Dipper—"

"I know, Mom," Dipper said.

He went upstairs to their bedroom, where Mabel was carefully pulling on her sweater. "Did I muss up my hair?"

"No, it's fine," Dipper said. He pulled over the little step-stool, climbed on it, and took down his green jacket from the closet.

"Wait, wait," Mabel said. "It's picture day! Aren't you gonna change your shirt?"

"This is a good shirt," Dipper said.

Mabel put her hands on her hips and shook her head. "Bro-Dip, it's so blah! I mean, it's just _gray_. Wear your red one!"

"It's in the laundry," Dipper said. "This is fine. Nobody's going to look at my picture, anyhow."

"Aw, don't be like that!" Mabel had set her lunch box down on her bed and opened it. She pulled open a bureau drawer and began to stuff colorful plastic bands in, smooshing her sandwich and crunching her chips.

"What are you doing?" Dipper asked her.

"Packing slap bracelets! 'Cause I want my picture to look fabulous. Hey, I got tons of these—want to wear some?" Mabel held up a double handful, yellow, red, green, blue, orange, pink, and maybe some colors that only bees can see.

"No, I'll pass."

Mabel had to force her lunchbox to close so she could flip the latches. "There! Mom will never know!"

"Wait," Dipper said. "You _did_ ask her if it was OK to take those to school, right?"

"Duh, no!" Mabel said. "What if she told me it wasn't? This way I get the picture I want. Hey, Dipper, don't tell Mom, OK? Let it be a surprise when she sees the pictures."

Dipper pulled on and zipped his jacket, or tried to. "Darn it!"

"Here, let me." Dipper always had some trouble lining up the zipper with the bottom pin. Mabel popped it in and then started the zipper for him. "There you go."

"Thanks, Mabel." Dipper zipped up his jacket the rest of the way. And sneezed.

"Bless you!" Mabel said.

"Let's go!" yelled Mom from the bottom of the stair.

Dipper took his blue knitted watch cap from a drawer and grabbed his backpack. "Coming!"

Mabel snatched up her lunch box and her Big Bird book satchel. "Race you!"

But Dipper just followed her, knowing if they both ran downstairs, Mom would scold them. This way, Mom would only yell at Mabel, "Don't run so fast on the steps!" Which she did.

Mom handed Dipper his lunchbox. They hurried outside and climbed into Mom's car, Mabel riding shotgun and Dipper alone in the rear seat. "Seatbelts," Mom said.

"Ready," Dipper replied, clicking his.

"Locked and loaded!" Mabel said. "School, here we come!"

"Mabel," Mom said sternly, "this time, don't make a silly face."

"I would never!" Mabel said. "That would mess up my cuteness! Dipper, don't make a—oh, I forgot, Dip would never make a silly face. He'll look the way he did last year, like he has a stomach ache!"

"Dipper," his mother advised, a little more gently, "This year—smile."

Dipper sneezed.

So began the morning of Tuesday, October 10, 2006—photo day at Eggbert Elementary School in Piedmont, California. It was a semi-overcast day, cool but dry. Except for the evergreens, the trees were shedding leaves. A constant breeze was blowing, making it seem brisker than the temperature—sixty degrees—would seem.

It should have been a great day. Or anyway, an OK one. It would turn out to be—not quite so good.

* * *


	2. Chapter 2

**Revenge of the Gum-Bummed**

(October 10-13, 2006)

* * *

**2**

The Pines twins' first-grade teacher had been Mr. Swenson, a youngish, bespectacled, mild-mannered guy. Now they were in the second grade, and their classroom was the next one down the hall from Mr. Swenson's. Eggbert Elementary wasn't all that big, and there were a total of three first-grade classes and three second-grade ones.

They passed Mr. Swenson's room on the way to their own classroom, Mrs. Martweiler's. Mabel paused to duck into Mr. Swenson's and say, "Hi, Mr. Swenson! Ready for picture day?"

"Hi, Mabel," he said with a grin. "Yep! You're looking very elegant this morning."

"Thanks!" she said. "Elegant was what I was going for!"

Dipper waved, but didn't say anything—he was normally pretty reticent with adults, even ones he knew well. Mrs. Martweiller waited just outside the door to his and Mabel's classroom, and she greeted him: "Good morning, Dipper. I like your cap. It must be very warm!"

"Hi, Mrs. Martweiller," he said. "It's pretty comfy."

Mabel caught up. "Good morning, dear teacher!" she exclaimed. She spread her arms and pirouetted. "How's this for picture day?"

"Very nice," the teacher said with a smile. "Sort of a Pink Rainbow Princess effect!"

"Thank you!"

As Dipper and Mabel made their way to their desks—they sat side-by-side in the third and fourth rows—Chloe Marino, black-haired and olive-complexioned, muttered, "Suck-up!"

"Thanks for the compliment!" Mabel chirped. Even from his desk, on the far side of Mabel from Chloe, Dipper heard Chloe grinding her teeth. He couldn't help smiling. Mabel was unsinkable, and Chloe, one of those kids who really liked putting other girls down, for some reason had zeroed in on Mabel as one she liked to bully. It never worked. Mabel was always upbeat and unperturbed by Chloe's sniping.

The rest of the class came in, settled in their desks, and chatted. Dipper, who had taken off his jacket and cap, noticed how about half the class looked slicked-up, while the other half looked as if it were just another day. Eugene Smedley, whose hair was normally a rumpled mess, had—or more likely, his mom had—slicked the mop down with some kind of hair preparation, making Smedley look a little strange. Laura Freeling, though, looked nice—in the same way he thought, she always looked nice—with no change in her hairstyle or clothes.

He fit into the second category, those who didn't try to change their look. Here he was in a short-sleeved, gray tee shirt, jeans, and his normal red sneakers. He looked presentable, and that satisfied him. True, sometimes he found it fun to dress up, like on Halloween, when he and Mabel always came up with some neat costume ideas for twins. Though Dipper didn't clearly recall, at three they had won first prize in a costume competition at the mall—as cute kittens. They had also been Daffy and Marvin the Martian one year, an egg and bacon another—unusual costumes, and fun to wear, for one night a year, anyway.

But photo day didn't seem to be as special as Halloween, and the occasion certainly wasn't fun. Dad didn't much care about the school photo packages, although Mom was super-critical. She was sure to lament, "Oh, Mabel! Do you always have to stick out your tongue?" or "Dipper, I wish you'd smile more in these. You have a nice smile, but you always look so glum."

Mrs. Martweiller led the class through the Pledge of Allegiance and shushed them for the morning announcements, coming from the office over the P.A. Then at the whiteboard, she used a red marker to print a schedule:

Photos:

9-10 Grade 1

10-11 Grade 2

Under that she added, "Our class will go out to the courtyard at 10:40."

She read the list aloud, then asked, "What will the clock look like when the time is 10:40?" And she called on Dipper, who didn't even raise his hand.

"Um, big hand on the eight, little hand partway between ten and eleven," he said.

"Very good. All right, class, don't let me forget when the time comes. Someone be sure to remind me."

From there they went into math. They did an addition worksheet—1+3, 5+7, all the way up to 9+9. Then they went on to reading—they took turns reading aloud from a short story ("Freddy and the Dragon") and then answered questions about what happened, such as: "What did Freddy expect the dragon to be like?" and "How did the dragon surprise Freddy?"

Mabel was eager to answer, but Mrs. Martweiller was careful to call on her only twice. When she did answer, she was bubbly: "Freddy was afraid the dragon would be all fierce and breathe fire on him and scorch his eyebrows off!" When it was Dipper's turn, he was more to the point: "The dragon was friendly." In general, Dipper was one of the best aloud readers, hardly ever missing a word or stumbling, while Mabel wasn't as accurate but a lot more dramatic. Chloe read everything in a loud voice, but with little expression. And she thought the story was weak. "Nothing much happens," she complained. "The dragon doesn't even eat anyone."

After that they moved on to Health. Today the lesson was on a well-balanced diet. And just after that ended, Chloe raised her hand. "Oh, Mrs. Martweiller, it's almost ten-forty."

"Thank you, Chloe," Mrs. Martweiller said. "Let's have our leaders come up front. We'll go to the restrooms first. Be sure to wash your hands when you finish, and see if you need to comb your hair or tidy up."

Dipper donned his jacket and cap, but the day had warmed up, with the temperature nearly at seventy. Still, he started to sneeze almost right away, and he decided to keep bundled up until it was time for him to sit in the photographer's chair. They were in the little courtyard just behind the school, leading out into the playground. The courtyard was paved, the concrete decorated by chalked hopscotch courts, as well as decorative circles, squares, and triangles.

Mabel had raided her lunchbox for her slap bracelets and started to put them on her arms as the class sat in folding chairs, waiting for the second-grade class that had got there before them to finish hopping onto the chair in front of the backdrop, smile, and remain fairly still while the photographer shot five exposures of each student, just for insurance.

The photographer's assistant, a plump, good-humored blonde, kept order. Mrs. Martweiller had gone back into the school. If she had remained, she might have wondered if the math lessons were taking. Mabel kept count as she slapped or gripped the bracelets onto her arms: "One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, a hundred!"

By the time she finished, she was able to crow, "Boom! A million slap bracelets! I'm gonna have the best photo ever!" She shook her head and called out to all the kids waiting their turn on the row of folding chairs, "And how d'you like my new pigtaaailllls?"

Then it happened. Chloe, moving from down the line up to the front so she could bully Jacob Levinson into trading seats with her, suddenly slapped her hand down on Mabel's head and sneered, "Have fun, brat!"

Mabel, with a stricken expression, felt her head and wailed, "Ahh! Gum! You ruined my hair!" Tears spilled from her eyes as she turned to her brother: "Dipper, what do I do?"

Dipper blinked and heard himself stammering. Mabel ran around the corner, weeping.

Unfortunately, neither the photographer nor his assistant had noticed what Chloe had done. Dipper hopped up and hurried into the school. He was halfway to the first-and-second-grade hall when he stopped. _What am I doing? What can I tell Mrs. Martweiller? What could she even do?_

He stopped running and stood in uncertainty. OK, what would be the best result? Maybe Mrs. Martweiller would punish Chloe, but that wouldn't help Mabel, or even make her feel better. It wouldn't get the gum out of his sister's hair—she'd had gum trouble before, when she'd fallen asleep with a wad of Double Bubble in her mouth and then awakened to discover it somehow had lodged just above her right ear. That was an ordeal.

But he had to do something. He was passing Mr. Swenson's room when the idea struck him. The class was elsewhere—probably it was music time, which Dipper recalled having every Tuesday at about this hour, down the next hall in the music room. And Mr. Swenson, like Mr. Pines, developed heavy five o'clock shadow by about noon, and Dipper had seen him—

He ducked into the empty classroom. He didn't think Mr. Swenson would mind. Even if he objected, Dipper had to do something! Dipper pulled open the bottom right drawer of the teacher's desk, and there it was. Dipper snatched up the battery-powered electric razor, pushed the on button, and felt the thing buzzing.

Snapping the razor off, Dipper rushed back out to the courtyard, hunting Mabel. She stood near the backdrop—in fact, she was next in line for a picture, but she looked miserable. Dipper hastily took off his jacket and dropped it on a chair before running to her. "Mabel! I figured out a way to fix your hair!"

She gave him a miserable glance. "What, you have a wig?"

"No," he admitted. "But—I have a razor!" He pulled his cap off, turned the razor on, and buzz-cut a swath through his hair. Then he grinned at her.

After a moment of shock, Mabel laughed and said, "You're crazy," but her tone was warm. She took the razor from him and cut the gum right out of her hair—along with a stripe that went from forehead to nape.

"Next!" the photographer's assistant called.

Dipper set the razor down and asked, "Together?"

"Together!" Mabel said.

So they posed for—OK, let's just say it—the goofiest photo taken at Eggbert Elementary that year. The photographer's assistant looked shocked. Dipper picked up the razor and his jacket and cap, and then after a moment's thought, handed the cap to Mabel. Mrs. Martweiller came out and the kids all posed for a group class photo. Dipper and Mabel were in the second row from the front, left side.

Only as they headed in did Mrs. Martweiller finally register how strange they looked. "What did you do?" she asked.

Mabel answered: "I had a bad hair accident, and Dipper came to the rescue!"

"I think," Mrs. Martweiller said, "you two will need to wait in the principal's office while I let your folks know."

Mr. Swenson, just leading his own class back into the room, was a bit surprised as Dipper handed him the razor and said, "Thanks, sir!'

"You're . . . welcome?" the teacher said.

In the principal's office, Mrs. Martweiller called their mom. Mabel then took the phone and explained what had happened: "I accidentally got some gum in my hair, and so Dipper helped me by borrowing a razor to cut it out. He cut his hair, so we matched, and we got the best school photo ever! What? No, please don't." She looked at Dipper while telling their mom, "We'll stay at school. We don't mind, do we, Dipper?"

He shook his head. "Thanks, Mom," she said. She handed the phone back to her teacher. "Mom says we can stay."

Mrs. Martweiller spoke to Mrs. Pines for a minute, then said, "Thank you, Mrs. Pines. That will be fine." She hung up and said to the twins, "All right, let's go back to class, but let me know if anyone makes fun of you."

"Um, could I wear this?" Mabel asked, pulling Dipper's hat on.

"Under the circumstances, yes," their teacher said. The initial shock had worn off, and she shook her head, smiling. "Mabel, you always surprise me. How did you accidentally get gum in your hair? You're not even supposed to have gum at school!"

"She didn't!" Dipper blurted. "It was someone—"

"Um," Mabel interrupted, "I think someone inside the school must have flipped a piece of gum out the window or something. But it stuck real good. Do I look OK in the cap?"

"Fine," their teacher said as they left the office and headed back to the classroom. "Only why didn't Dipper just let you wear it for your photo?"

Dipper slapped his forehead, feeling like the world's biggest idiot.

They got back, the class quieted down, and a few people hooted at Dipper's new hairstyle, but Mrs. Martweiller put a quick end to that. Social Studies was coming up, and then lunch.

As Mrs. Martweiller began to erase the whiteboard, Chloe whispered something to another girl and they both snickered.

Mabel passed Dipper a note.

In block capitals, it read, I NEED REVVING!

Dipper, familiar with Mabel's one-of-a-kind spelling, wondered what form his sister's revenge would take.

* * *


	3. Chapter 3

**Revenge of the Gum-Bummed**

(October 10-13, 2006)

* * *

**3**

When Wanda picked her children up, she barely looked at them. “Get in the car,” she said. When they did, she said, “Buckle up.”

“Mom—” Dipper began.

“Wait until we’re home,” Mom said through tight lips.

She drove to their house, parked in the garage, and then said, “Come on. Living room.”

Mabel walked with draggy steps, lugging her book satchel, and Dipper came right behind her, holding his backpack by the straps. Wanda sat on the sofa in the living room, turned on both the overhead light and the lamp beside the sofa and said, “Let me see.”

She looked at Mabel first. “Oh, Mabel,” she moaned. “Whatever possessed you to do this?”

“Mom,” Mabel said, “I had this big wad of bubble gum in my hair, see? I tried to pull it out, but it just kept sticking and spreading and making these yucky long pink strings.”

“Who put gum in your hair?” she asked.

Mabel shot Dipper a pleading look. “I don’t know. It could have been tossed out of a window.”

“Nobody’s supposed to chew gum at school,” Dipper put in.

“I’m talking to your sister right now,” Mom said.

“Sorry.”

“Why didn’t you tell your teacher?” Mom asked.

Tears ran down Mabel’s cheeks. “She—she—she—”

Dipper said, “Mrs. Martweiller went back inside. There was a lady there helping the photographer man, and she was sort of keeping order, but we didn’t know her.”

“You should have gone to your teacher,” Wanda said. “Why didn’t you put Dipper’s cap on over your hair?”

“Didn’t think of it,” Mabel muttered.

“What in the world did you use to cut your hair?”

Dipper squirmed. “Uh, I, uh, borrowed Mr. Swenson’s electric razor.”

“Your first-grade teacher?” Wanda asked. “Did you tell him why you wanted it?”

Dipper shook his head. “He wasn’t in his room, but I remembered he used to keep a razor in his desk, and, uh, I borrowed it. I gave it back!”

“Let me see your hair, Dipper.”

Dipper came close, and she put her hand under his chin, tilting his head. “Well, you’re really twins,” she said. “If anything like this happens, you have to go to your teacher. Will you do that if anything like this happens again?”

Mabel nodded. “What are you gonna do to us, Mom?”

“The first thing is to take you to the stylist to see what we can do to make this look less . . . drastic. I guess you could get one of those punk-style haircuts, Mabel—one side short, the other long. Dipper could just get a short haircut—”

“Mom, no,” Dipper pleaded. He bit his lower lip. “My birthmark. You know.”

“Maybe,” she said, “we can have the sides trimmed, but leave the top long, so you can comb it down over your forehead. Come on. I’ve made an appointment for both of you.”

They drove into town and went to Sheared-locks Combs, where an operator named Madison, who usually did their trims, looked at the damage. “OK,” she said. What do we want to do here?”

“Make them look normal,” Wanda said. “Enough so they don’t get teased all the time.”

“OK.” Madison got a book of hair styles. “This is a hawkadour. Part Mohawk, part pompadour. Right side undercut, left combed up and over to the right.”

“Um—OK,” Mabel said. “Mom?”

“How long will it take to get back to normal?” Wanda asked.

“Well, the undercut will be pretty drastic. I’d say probably six to eight months.”

With a sigh, Wanda said, “I suppose that’s about the best we can do. Mabel, can you get by with this look?”

“Um, I think so,” Mabel said. “It’s kinda an older look. I know a couple of fifth-grade girls have a style sort of like that.”

“Let’s do it,” Wanda said.

It took a while, but when Madison showed Mabel how she looked in a mirror, while holding a second mirror behind her head, Mabel said, “Mabel like. I’m gonna take some teasing tomorrow, but yeah, I’ll ride it out. Everybody will get used to it before long.”

Then it was Dipper’s turn. Madison studied him. “I know you want to keep the bangs,” she said in a kind voice. She was one of the few people who knew about his birthmark these days—he had been mercilessly teased about it when he was in preschool and kindergarten, and ever since first grade, he’d brushed his hair down over his forehead.

“Yeah, if you can, please,” Dipper said.

“All right, what we can do is a fade,” Madison said. “Both sides short, tapering up to the full top, and you can still brush your hair over the birthmark. I’ll be careful to make sure it works.”

“Mom?” Dipper asked.

“I think it’s what you’ll have to do,” she said. “Now, when you father gets home, you two are going to have to explain your new looks.”

“OK,” Dipper said.

He got into the chair—he and Mabel still had to sit on a booster—and Madison put an apron over him. “You’re going to have to stay real still,” Madison warned.

He tried his best, though he wanted to squirm as he felt the clippers moving up from his ears to high on his head. At one point, Mom said, “Leave those if you can, Madison.”

“Sure thing,” Madison said. “This is shaping up a little better than I thought it would. Let me just even this up.”

A little more buzzing, some brushing, a spritz of spray, and Madison said, “What do you think?”

Dipper looked at the unfamiliar face in the mirror. He ran his hand over the back of his neck and felt the prickle of a very short buzz cut. “It’s different,” he said. But at least the brush-forward covered his forehead.

“That’ll do,” Wanda said, though she was shaking her head.

“Gotta ask, kids—why?” Madison said.

“Bubble gum,” Mabel said, sounding both angry and sad. “It got real stuck, and today was picture day at school.”

“Oh, no,” Madison said sympathetically.

“So Dipper cut his hair to look like me, and then I cut the bubble gum out. We posed together, and I think the picture might be really cool, but—you know. Ruined our hair. I’ll miss my pigtails.”

“Give it time,” Madison said. “By next summer, you should be good to go with the pigtails again.”

Mom paid the bill, tipped Madison, and they got back into Mom’s car. She drove them home and then said, “I don’t think I want to cook tonight. What would you two like for dinner this evening?”

“Pizza!” Mabel said at once.

“That would be fine,” Dipper agreed.

“I thought so,” Wanda said. “I’ll call your father and see if that’s all right with him.” She checked the time—a little after four P.M. “He should be closing down his office right now. I’ll phone him.”

She had a short conversation with Alex, then asked, “Would you mind if we ate around six-thirty? I know that’s early.” She listened for a few seconds and then said, “I don’t know. How about you?” Another pause. “That will be fine. All right. Just a second. Kids, cheese and veggies?”

“Where from?” Mabel asked.

“Reach for the Pie,” Mom said. “Dad will pick it up on the way home.”

“Oh, I like their pizza! Yeah, cheese and veggie.”

“That’s fine with me,” Dipper said.

Into the phone, Mom said, “Cheese and veggie, medium, for the kids. Is a deluxe OK with you? Then get one of those for us. Full-sized, not their Giganto. Oh, and add a salad-to-share.”

“Chocolate cannoli!” Mabel said.

“Thanks, dear,” Mom said. “And brace yourself. You’ll see why when you get home. Love you, too.” She hung up and said firmly, “No cannoli. Consider that part of your punishment.”

“Part?” Dipper squeaked. “Uh—what’s the rest, Mom?”

“Your father and I will talk that over,” she said. “Do you have homework?”

“Little bit,” Mabel said. “Some reading and two worksheets.”

“Then go up to your room and get that done. Your dad will be home a little after six, and I’ll call you down to dinner then.”

“OK,” Dipper said. “Come on, Sis.”

They went upstairs. Mabel went into the bathroom to stare at her reflection, turning her head this way and that. “I look weird,” she said. “I guess it’s OK. We’re gonna get it tomorrow from the kids at school, though.”

“Tell me about it,” Dipper said. He swept his hands across the sides of his head. “Does this look real sick?”

She gave him a critical look. “You look different,” she told him. “But kinda interesting. Girls might even want to talk to you.”

He looked a little sick. “Maybe I should practice some things to say.”

“Just go with the flow, Bro-Dip!” Mabel said, giving him a little shove.

“What does that even mean?” he asked.

“I don’t know! Just, you know, listen to the girl and then talk back based on what you hear. For instance, OK, I’m a girl in our class, and I ask you, ‘Do you like Lifehouse,’ what would you tell her?”

“Um, ‘I don’t know what that is.’”

“Wrong one thousand!” Mabel said. “You say, ‘Cool. Tell me why you like Lifehouse.’ And go from there!”

“I’d say something dumb,” he complained.

“Duh! You’re a boy. Everybody expects that from a boy.”

“We better go do our homework.”

He checked her math worksheet—a mix of addition and subtraction, with little pictures to help get started, like 9-4, with nine little bunnies so you could cross out four and then count how many were left, except Mabel first had to enhance the pictures so each bunny had his or her own distinctive appearance. She missed two out of thirty problems, which wasn’t too bad. He helped her with spelling on the handwriting sheet, where they had to write responses to things like “What is your favorite animal? Why do you like this animal?”

Mabel wrote, “My favorite annimal is pigs because they are so cute and fat.”

“Look,” Dipper told her, “Here’s the word ‘animal’ in the question. See how you need to spell it?”

“Oh, sugar!” Mabel said, sounding a little frustrated. “I always get that wrong.” She carefully erased the word and then wrote it again, correctly.

Dipper had written, “My favorite animal is the T-Rex, because it is a scary dinosaur.” He could have written more, but he stuck to the basics for this assignment.

They finished a little before the time for Dad to return. Mabel lay on her bed, with her head hanging off upside-down. “We need to talk about revenge, Bro-Dip. How do I get back at Chloe?”

“You might tell Mrs. Martweiller what she did to you,” Dipper said.

“That boat has been sold,” Mabel said.

“You mean ‘That boat has sailed?’” Dipper asked.

“Do I? I don’t know. I don’t guess we could beat Chloe up, could we?”

“Wouldn’t work,” Dipper said. “She has too many friends who’d help her out.”

“Yeah. Well. Let me think about it. Best would be if we could trick her into punishing herself. But that has to be a real sneaky one. I’ll think it over—”

They heard Dad call, “Pizza’s here!”

“—after pizza!” Mabel said. “We’ll talk about this more later, Dipper.”

They went down, Dad blinked at their new hairstyles in obvious astonishment, and Mom had Mabel tell him the whole story. “Poor baby!” Alex said when he heard about the gum. “I can’t say I approve of your solution, but I understand. If anything like this happens again—”

“I go to the teacher,” Mabel said. “Yeah, I know.”

They settled down to their dinner. Of all the pizzerias in the area, Reach for the Pie made the tastiest pizzas. Mabel ate four and a half slices of the kids’ medium pie, Dipper three slices, leaving half a slice for later. And though Dad hadn’t brought cannoli home, they had a satisfactory dessert of mixed berries.

Dad had a talk with them after dinner, telling them to behave themselves in school the next day. “Watch your step,” he said. “If people give you a hard time, let the teacher know.”

“Aw, I don’t want to be a squealer,” Mabel said.

“At least, don’t react. Just walk away,” Dad advised.

Mabel nodded. “Got you.”

But that night, as they lay in the dark, from across the room, Mabel said to Dipper, “About my revenge . . . .”

And he knew it wasn’t over yet.

* * *


	4. Chapter 4

**Revenge of the Gum-Bummed**

(October 10-13, 2006)

* * *

**4**

On Wednesday morning the Pines twins steeled themselves for the kids' reactions to their new hair styles. Uncharacteristically, they got ready ahead of time and Mom drove them to school about ten minutes ahead of schedule.

As they entered the school, Mabel attracted a couple of comments from students—more than a couple, in fact, three in total. A girl they didn't know just looked at her flip hairstyle and widened her eyes as she said, "Whoa!"

"Was that positive or negative?" Mabel asked Dipper.

"I guess neutral?" he replied. "Hey, look, she gave you a thumbs-up. Good, then."

Then near the drinking fountain Trey Moulter, a boy who had been in their first-grade class but this year had a different second-grade teacher, called out, "Hey, Mabel! Sharp!"

"He didn't sound sarcastic," Dipper said before Mabel could ask. She'd played with Trey on the playground last year, but Dipper had never particularly liked the guy.

Next, Shayla, a girl in Mrs. Martweiller's second grade, did a double-take as they walked past, pointed, and laughed.

"Don't try to say that's good," Mabel said glumly.

"Not good," he agreed. "But maybe she's just surprised."

They got to the classroom ahead of almost everyone else, and the few kids who were already there were talking together and didn't really look at them. "Want to trade seats?" Dipper asked Mabel. He sat in the last desk on the left side of the room, with just the wall on his left side.

"No," Mabel said with a sigh. "I guess I gotta take it." She sniffled.

"Hey, only one bad out of three," Dipper said.

"Yeah, but the good ones don't help and the bad one hurts," she said. "How come nobody's said anything about _your_ new do?"

"I guess I'm just under the radar."

She rubbed her nose and blinked. "Huh?"

"Dad says that sometimes. It means nobody ever notices me."

"Aw, Dip."

"I'm kinda used to it." He pulled out his handkerchief and sneezed into it.

Mrs. Martweiller came in. It was still early, but a few more kids were trickling in. She glanced around, making sure that the kids already in weren't getting into any trouble. Her gaze landed on Mabel and Dipper, and she came over to them. No one was yet sitting very close to them. "You look nice that way," she said in a quiet voice and with an encouraging smile. "I'm sorry about your accident."

"That's OK, it wasn't your fault," Mabel said. "How about Dipper?"

Mrs. Martweiller smiled at him, too. "Dipper, you look very rad. Is that the right word? Rad?"

Dipper, who had watched reruns of the mutant-turtles TV show from the 1980s, nodded shyly.

The teacher said, "If anyone says anything insulting, come and tell me."

"Thanks," Dipper said, hardly louder than a whisper.

Mabel sniffed and again rubbed her nose. "Itchy."

Chloe came in, sat in her desk next to Mabel, and stared at her with a smirk. But with Mrs. Martweiller standing near and watching, she didn't say anything.

Mabel raised her hand, even though class had not started, and Mrs. Martweiller asked, "Yes, Mabel, what is it?"

"If we have juice, may we drink it now?" she asked.

The teacher glanced at the clock. Still seven minutes until the bell. "A juice box?"

Mabel took it out from her lunchbox. It was one of those four-ounce apple-juice boxes, beloved by toddlers everywhere. "This one?" Mabel asked.

"Finish by the bell," Mrs. Martweiller said, and she went over to stop a small squabble between a couple of kids just coming in.

It wasn't all that unusual. Lots of mornings, some kids came to school with juice boxes left over from breakfast, and most mornings if there were time, Mrs. Martweiller let them polish off the drinks. If not, they had a fifteen-minute break from 11:00 to 11:15 when they could have snacks—they had late lunch this year, at 12:15, and kids tended to get hungry early.

Anyway, Mabel stuck her tongue firmly in the corner of her mouth, closed one eye, and stabbed the box with the tiny straw. Then she took a long sip and wound up with "Ahhh."

Mrs. Martweiller went to the door to summon in the latecomers, who sometimes dawdled in the hall to talk to other kids, and Chloe leaned over. "Punky!" she whispered. "Punky Pines! That's your name now!" And she snickered.

"I like it!" Mabel returned with her widest smile. That pulled a scowl from Chloe.

For some reason, Mrs. Martweiller kept the class very busy that day. At lunch, one of the lunchroom ladies said, "You look very pretty, Mabel!" Although a couple of other kids who knew her stared and even laughed, nobody said anything hurtful.

Just as Dad predicted, Mabel began to sneeze the minute they stepped out onto the playground for recess. And Dipper sneezed over and over again, a Chinese-firecracker string of sneezes, but not explosive. He had the quiet kind of ' _choo!_ sneeze that sounded more appropriate to a baby. Mabel's weren't as continuous, but were louder, with a run-up: " _wahhhhhhh-choo!"_

Dipper dabbed his nose with a handkerchief, and Mrs. Martweiller gave Mabel a little bunch of tissues. "Maybe you two had better stay inside today," she said. "Allergies?"

"Yump," Mabel said, blowing her nose, which was turning pink.

"Our allergies act up at the same time," Dipper explained.

Mrs. Martweiller called to Miss Ruchelle, another second-grade teacher: "Em, would you look after my students for about two minutes? Thanks!" Then their teacher led the twins back to the lunchroom, near the door out to the playground. Lunch was over, but Mrs. Martweiller asked one of the lunch ladies if Dipper and Mabel could sit at a table near the door. "They have allergies today," she explained.

"Sure, just sit quiet," the lady said.

So Dipper and Mabel sat at the table closest to the lunchroom door. Dipper's allergies were still a little worse than his sister's, and he took a couple of paper napkins to dab at his watery eyes. "It's going to be rough for the next week or two," he said.

"I dow," Mabel, whose nose was getting stuffy, said. "I feel like somebody is binching by doze."

"Gets me more in my eyes," Dipper said, dabbing with a napkin.

"By revenge is started, doh," Mabel said.

"What?" Dipper asked.

"Just wait," Mabel said with a grin.

They both sneezed together.

* * *

When they got home, Mom took one look at their red eyelids and pink noses and broke out the mild antihistamine that their pediatrician had prescribed. After an hour or so, it helped. Dipper's eyes were still itchy, but at least they didn't drip. Mabel's nose opened up enough so she could pronounce her words more clearly.

"Ragweed," Dad diagnosed when he got home from work. "I noticed patches of it across the street from the school, near the corner with Lake. Or it might even be the privet hedge running along Linda Avenue. That's straight across from the school."

"It might also be mold," Wanda said. "That sets your allergies off, and there are a lot of deciduous trees on the school grounds."

"What are those?" Mabel asked.

"They're the trees with the leaves that fall off," Dipper told her. "Not like the evergreens."

"Oh, yeah, I knew that," Mabel said. "I just forgot. Yeah, there's piles of leaves that fell off and the wind blew against tree roots and curbs and walls and stuff. They cause sneezing?"

"They might when they get damp and moldy," Dad said. "It depends on what you're allergic to. If your sneezing gets worse, we can ask Dr. Proctor to test you two and see what you're allergic to. You can probably be desensitized, but that can be a long process."

"' _Choo_!" said Dipper.

"You're just like my dad," Alex said, smiling at him.

The kids barely remembered their grandfather, who had died a couple of years earlier, but his photo hung on the stairwell wall. He was a pale man with the Pines unruly hair, down to the two rounded floofs of cowlicks in the back. He had a square chin, black-rimmed glasses, heavy brows, and a large, very pink nose, but he looked too thin. He had passed away after suffering for many years from a rare blood disease.

"Poor Grandpop," Mabel said.

"He used to sneeze for four months out of the year," Alex said. "April and May, then September and October. Ragweed was his mortal enemy, he always said, and that may be true for you and Dipper, too. Let's start by seeing if the city can get rid of that ragweed close to the school, and that will probably help."

After dinner, as the kids were doing their homework, Mabel said, "I hate that anti-sneeze medicine. It makes me feel kinda sleepy."

"Yeah, but it's better than having tears drip off my face and sneezing fifty times a minute," Dipper said.

"You counted?"

"Just a guess," he said.

They swapped math worksheets and checked each other's work, and as they finished, Dipper asked, "What did you mean your revenge has started? What did you do to her?"

Mabel grinned in a wicked sort of way. "Nothing yet. Just baited the old hook, Bro-Dip!"

"Are you really OK with her calling you 'Punky?'" Dipper asked.

"It's like they say," Mabel told him. "Sticks and stones can break your bones, but birds won't ever hurt you, unless you're a worm."

"That makes no sense," Dipper said.

"Maybe I said it wrong. It means that what people say about you shouldn't make you upset. I don't want to be called Punky at all."

"I didn't think you did, but you told Chloe—"

"Shut her up, didn't it?" Mabel asked. "She _wanted_ me to be upset. When I told her I liked what she called me, she stopped. Now she's trying to think up something worse to call me. I got some time. And my revengeance—is that a word?"

"I don't think so. It's either _revenge_ or _vengeance_."

"What's the difference?"

Dipper shrugged. "I don't know. I think they mean the same thing."

"That's dumb."

"Lots of words mean the same things as others. Synamins."

"Cinnamon? Yum!"

Dipper frowned and shook his head. "No, that's wrong. It's syn—uh, syna—I don't remember exactly. It's a big word and it means a word that's the same as another one."

"Synonyms!" Mabel said.

"That's it. Like _big_ and _large._ "

" _Ship_ and _boat!_ "

Dipper scratched his head. "I don't know if that works as synonyms. Because I think a ship is bigger than a boat. I think if there's a difference, it's not a synonym."

"I guess we'll learn about that someday," Mabel said.

Still later, as they were getting ready for bed, Dipper asked, "Hey, you sidetracked me. What did you mean you've started your revenge?"

Chuckling, Mabel said, "Wait a day or two, Bro-Dip. Oh, do you know where the old toy jumping frog is?"

"I don't even remember a jumping frog," he said.

"Oh, you do, too! It's got like a balloony sort of rubber bulb, and a long clear plastic tube, and the frog's rubber and when you squeeze the bulb, the frog's hind legs blow up like balloons, and the frog hops."

"Oh, yeah!" Dipper said. "I don't think we've played with that since we were like four years old."

"Where is it?"

"Maybe Mom threw it out. But if she didn't, I guess it would be way down in the bottom of our toy box."

"That makes sense."

Before they went to bed, Mabel rummaged in the toy box. It held a lot of stuff—a Rubik's Cube that had all the colors peeled off, so you couldn't help solving it immediately (solid blue plastic, all sides); a disabled Slinky with a kink partway down, so when it tried to climb down the stairs, it almost always tripped and tumbled; an assortment of hamburger-restaurant movie tie-ins, from Nemo and his friends, who squirted water, to plastic superheroes based on the Backstreet Boys; and lots of other things that Dipper and Mabel no longer played with. As she reached the bottom of the box, Mabel emerged at last with a triumphant "Ah-hah!"

She set the frog on Dipper's bed and squeezed the bulb.

The green-with-yellow-spots-frog opened its mouth, shot out a rolled-up pink rubber tongue, and hopped. "He's still got it! Yay! Go, Hoppy, go!"

"I remember this now," Dipper said as the rubber toy plopped down on his pillow. "What are you going to do, scare Chloe into thinking it's a real frog?"

"Wait and see," Mabel said mysteriously, reaching over to retrieve Mr. Hoppy. She got into her bed and cuddled the frog toy against her cheek. "Maybe I should kiss Hoppy and turn him into a rubber prince. No, I got a better use for him. Dip, sorry, but you're just gonna have to wait and see!"

* * *


	5. Chapter 5

**Revenge of the Gum-Bummed**

(October 10-13, 2006)

* * *

**5**

Thursday morning came, and again Mabel wanted Mom to drop them off at school about twenty minutes early.

"You never wanted to be there one second ahead of the bell before," Mom said to Mabel as they rushed to get ready to leave. "What's going on?"

Mabel was holding a mirror as she adjusted her new hairdo—it was harder to get it to look right than her old hairstyle had been. "Huh? I mean, excuse me, Mom?"

"I asked why you're suddenly wanting to get to school early when you never did before," Wanda said.

"Oh, well, you know, that was _first_ grade. I guess it's just the joy of higher education. There. How does that look?"

"Fine," Mom said.

Dipper sneezed.

"Did you take your antihistamine?" Mrs. Pines asked him.

Dabbing his pink nose with a paper napkin, Dipper said, "Yes. It hasn't started to work yet."

"Mabel, did you—"

"Yes, Mom, I took it. I'm ready to meet the day!"

But as they headed out the door, Mabel skidded to a stop. "Whoops! Forgot my juice. Just be a second!" She ran back and opened the pantry. Since both kids liked apple juice, Wanda bought it in cartons of eighteen boxes. After Mabel took some, there were still seven boxes left.

It was another cool morning—not even fifty degrees when they left home, with a thin, light drizzle tossed in for good measure—and Dipper was wearing his jacket and cap again, while Mabel had dressed in a thick sweater and scarf. Neither donned a rain slicker because Mom said the rain was supposed to trail off soon.

In the back seat, Dipper tugged the watch cap lower on his head, since the short hair on the sides now made his temples feel strangely chilly.

He looked out the side window as they made the short trip to Eggbert Elementary. He kept wondering what Mabel had up her sleeve—she stubbornly refused to tell him what she was planning. The worst part was that her refusal to confide in him was making him feel left out.

Dipper was used to the feeling. So many times, his parents, especially Dad, overlooked him. If the family was going out for dinner, Dad would always ask Mabel, "What do you feel like eating this evening, Sweetie?"

Dipper couldn't remember ever being asked that. Usually he was OK with Mabel's suggestion—burgers were good, Italian was usually good, family restaurants were all right with him—but now and then when Mabel wanted, say, "Pizza!' Dipper would make a face because he was really in the mood for, well, about anything other than pizza.

However, Alex Pines never, ever thought to ask him, "Is that all right with you, son?" Instead, Dad would say cheerfully, "Pizza it is!"

Not that Dipper ever complained, either. Sure, there were times when Dipper would just pick at whatever food Mabel had chosen and Mom would notice. "I'll make you a PB and J when we get home," she would tell him.

The thing was, he often wished that he had the kind of self-confidence that his sister did. She woke up cheerful, went through the day laughing, and would try anything without a second thought, or sometimes even a first one. Dipper was always hesitant, and he sort of hated that about himself. He told himself he was just cautious, but deep down he knew that he was scared.

Not physically—he'd never been in a real fight, though bullies had pushed him down now and then. Especially when he'd been four and five years old, Dipper got used to sandbox kids who enjoyed tripping him or giving him wedgies. And it was all because his birthmark singled him out as different. Even when he tried to hide it—wearing a cowboy hat, wearing a baseball cap, whatever—the other boys would as often as not steal it or at least toss it up in a tree, frustrating Dipper to tears.

And when Dipper wanted to go to Dad, Mabel would advise him, "Don't make him stick up for you, Dip. Yell for me, and I'll be there to save you."

But . . . he didn't want his own sister to have to step in when someone was pushing him around. As time went on, he got used to hovering in the corner of the playground, giving up a swing when another kid came along and wanted to use it, never joining games of chase or hide-and-seek because there were too many kids for his comfort. He and Mabel played together, or he played by himself.

By second grade he'd become resigned to being a lonely guy.

Though he often wished that, like Mabel, he could just walk up to a strange bunch of kids and say, "Hi! I'm Dipper! I'm seven years old, and I like mysteries! Want to play?"

Never in a million years, he thought with a sigh.

"Dipper!' Mom said gently. "Wake up. We're here. Your class may not get to go out on the playground today if the weather doesn't get better. If the rest of the class do go outside, and if your allergies are bothering you, Mrs. Martweiller says you and Mabel can stay inside at recess time, all right?"

"Thanks, Mom," he said as he unfastened his seat belt. Mabel had already hopped out of the passenger seat, and she opened the back door for him.

They hurried inside through the misting rain. They'd arrived way early that morning—Mr. Swenson and Mrs. Martweiller were standing in the hallway, chatting, and both of them greeted the Pines twins. "Early birds!" Mr. Swenson said.

"Let me at them worms!" Mabel shot back, laughing.

"I meant to tell you two yesterday," Mr. Swenson said, "Your haircuts are really amazing. Oh, Dipper, the you-know-what won't be kept in my desk any longer. But if you need something, ask for it, OK?"

Dipper nodded. "Yes, sir. I'm sorry I did that."

"I heard about the gum problem," he said. "It's funny, though—the windows on that side look into the lunchroom, and there shouldn't have been anybody in there to spit gum out that morning."

"Yeah, it's a mystery," Mabel agreed. Then she gave one of her epic sneezes.

"Gesundheit!" Mr. Swenson said. "Not a bad cold, is it?"

"Thanks. No, just allergies." She sniffled a little.

They were first in the classroom. Mabel took out her apple juice and set the little box on her desk. "Here's the plan," she said. "Before the bell rings, I'm gonna go up and sharpen my pencil. You bring a pencil and come up with me."

"I don't have a pencil that needs to be sharpened," Dipper said.

"Let me see yours. Thanks." Mabel snapped off the tip. "Now you do. Come on, Bro-Dip, back me up. it's part of the plan."

"I guess," he said.

A girl, Kristin, came in and stashed her books in her desk, all the way across the room, but then she walked over to them. "Hi," she said. "Dipper, your hair rocks. I just wanted to say."

Dipper turned pink. "Um. Well, you know. Thanks."

Kristin looked a little disappointed, but she turned to Mabel. "Yours is totes cool, too. Did it take long?"

"About half an hour," Mabel said. "But they had to use a ton of hairspray! Feel!"

"Whoa," Kristin said, lightly touching Mabel's flip. "I wish my Mom would let me get something grown-up like that. Well, um. OK. I just wanted to say."

"Thanks!" Mabel said. "Dipper?"

"Thank you," he murmured. She gave him an awkward wave and went back to her desk.

Mabel looked at her brother and sighed. "She wanted you to talk," she said softly.

"I don't know what to say."

"Oh, Bro-Dip. I'm gonna have to give you some pointers."

By then other kids were getting seated, Chloe among them. "Hi, Punky," she said in a kind of fake-friendly purr.

"Good morning, Chloe!" Mabel said brightly. "Is that a new raincoat?"

Chloe looked over to the far wall, where she had hung her raincoat on the row of hooks that ran half the length of the room. "What? No, I've had it since last summer. It just hasn't rained until today."

"Well, I think it's very attractive," Mabel said. "I like the butterflies!"

Chloe shrugged and took out a small pad. She liked to draw little sketches, and she ignored Mabel and Dipper to start drawing a butterfly with colored pencils.

Mabel stood up. "Gotta sharpen the old Ticonderoga!"

"Me, too," Dipper said.

They went to the front of the room, where the pencil sharpener was attached to the wall just to the left of the whiteboard. The yellow pencils had a cross-section like a rounded triangle—theoretically easier for small hands to use—that Mabel had found weird from the get-go. She was used to regular pencils at home, having begun to draw things with normal Number Twos when she was barely three years old.

She went first, holding the pencil with her left hand and cranking with her right, a bit awkward for her. "Let me, Sis," Dipper said. He cranked while she held the pencil, until it had a nice sharp tip. Then Dipper sharpened his own.

"How do you do that?" Mabel asked.

"What?"

"You can write with both hands. I mess up if I try."

"I don't know," Dipper said. It was true—he was a lefty, like his sister, but when he got tired of writing, he would shift to his right hand and continue on without losing anything in legibility.

"I'm gonna practice until I can do that too," Mabel said. "That's my goal between now and Christmas break! Yes!"

They returned to their desks. After a moment, Mabel asked, "Where's my juice box?"

Chloe had just finished sipping. "I don't know," she said with a smile. "This is mine."

"Oh, maybe I didn't get it out." Mabel opened her lunchbox. "Doy! Here it is. Silly me." She took out a second apple-juice box, stuck the straw in, and drank. "You like this brand, too?" she asked Chloe. "I see you have the same kind that I do."

"It's . . . it's what my mom buys, that's all," Chloe said, looking a little disgruntled.

"Johnny Apple Juice! It's the applest!" Mabel said. She held out her box. "A toast! Here's to a great school day!" After a moment of hesitation, Chloe raised her box and they clinked—well, not clinked, it's physically impossible to clink cardboard juice boxes, but they touched boxes, anyway. Then when they finished, Mabel got up and said, "Let me toss that for you."

She took the juice box from Chloe and, before walking to the wastebasket, took the time to hold the empty box so Chloe—and Dipper—could clearly see the bottom, with MABEL printed on it in permanent marker.

But Mabel did not make an issue of it, and Mrs. Martweiller came in and school started a few minutes later. It was a music day, and at ten they filed down the hall to the music room, where Mrs. Martweiller played the piano and they sang songs about autumn—"I Like to Watch the Leaves," "When Jack Frost Comes," and "Harvest Days." Hardly any of them could relate to the rural tone of the songs, but they enjoyed the forty minutes out of the classroom.

At lunchtime, Mabel briefly considered buying lunch because one selection that day was spaghetti, but in the end she decided just to eat the lunch her mom had packed. She and Dipper did get milk cartons, but both of them ate turkey wraps with cucumber, carrot slivers, and tomato (for Mabel; Dipper would always pick tomato off his sandwiches). They had tangerine sections as a side, and mini-cups of strawberry yogurt as dessert. As they ate, Dipper asked, "What was the idea, letting Chloe take your juice?"

"It's another sticky string in the spiderweb of my revenge!" Mabel said.

Dipper blinked at her. "Uh, OK."

"it will all become clear, Bro-O-Mine. Just wait until tomorrow. If she got away with sneaking my juice once, she'll do it again. Trust me on this."

"I hope we don't get in trouble," Dipper said.

Mabel gently punched his shoulder. "You worry too much."

"I know," Dipper said sadly. "I know I do."

* * *

To be continued


	6. Chapter 6

**Revenge of the Gum-Bummed**

(October 10-13, 2006)

* * *

**6**

On Friday morning, Mabel came down to breakfast wearing jeans and a long-sleeved sweater top, pink with a rainbow design. "Are you dressed too warmly?" her mom asked.

"When it's windy like today, I get chilly," Mabel said.

"As long as you're comfortable," Mrs. Pines said. "Did you kids—"

"We took our antihistamine," they said together.

"If you get itchy eyes or sneezy noses—"

"Mrs. Martweiller says we can stay inside at recess," Dipper said.

"We got this, Mom," Mabel said. "Yum! Pancakes! Hey, Dipper, syrup race?"

"No syrup race," Mom said firmly. "Last timed you both had sticky shirts for the rest of the day."

"Aw," Mabel said. "OK, OK." Dad came in, already in shirt and tie but not yet wearing his blazer—he had two for work, with the company's floppy-disk logo embroidered on the breast pockets.

Mom poured coffee for both of them, then brought two plates of pancakes and turkey sausage to the table. "Morning, you two," Dad said, bending to kiss Mabel on her forehead. "Your mother and I were talking. It's been a hard week—want to take a trip to the zoo tomorrow?"

"Yeah, we do!" Mabel said. "San Francisco Zoo, not Oakland!"

Dipper, engrossed in pouring maple syrup, didn't say anything, but nodded. Dad glanced at Mom. "I suppose," he said. It was a bit of a drive, but not as far as Dad's commute to work—that was about seventy-five minutes, but he was in a carpool with three others and didn't have to drive that distance every morning.

"I want to see the meerkats!" Mabel announced. "I love the meerkats!"

They finished breakfast, Dad left for work, and Wanda asked, "Do you want to leave early again today?"

"Yeah, we do!" Mabel said again. She very rarely said "No" to anything.

Mrs. Pines had already packed their lunches. Mabel went to the fridge for something and then "Hey, Mom," she said over her shoulder. "You need to put a carton of Johnny Apple Juice on the grocery list."

"It's on the refrigerator," she told Mabel. "Just add it."

Mabel had opened the lunchbox and was going back and forth between the counter and the fridge. Then she paused and frowned as she printed APPEL JUICE under Mom's "Doz eggs."

"Are you sure we're out?" Mom asked. "I thought there were still a few boxes."

"All gone," Mabel said, opening the freezer.

"I think you kids will have to pull back a little. One box a day each."

"Got it, Mom!" Mabel said.

"Dipper?"

"Hm? What?"

"Apple juice."

"No, thanks, Mom, it would taste weird with pancakes."

His mother very nearly laughed. "No, I said to cut back to no more than one box a day."

"Oh, I'm fine with that."

It was a breezy Friday, not as chilly as it had been the day before, but the wind made it feel cooler. Mom dropped them off and Dipper noticed Mabel carrying a brown paper lunch bag, odd because she had her lunchbox. "What's in the bag, Sis?"

She smiled mysteriously. "All will be revealed in time, Bro-Dip." Her lip swelled oddly. "I got another loose tooth! I can almost push it out with my tongue. If I play my cards right, I can get it to come out today, and then tomorrow morning, _ka-ching_!"

Dipper probed his own upper incisors. Last time, Mabel had lost her left top front tooth and then two days later, Dipper had lost his. Now both had a partly-grown permanent tooth. His right incisor did wiggle just a little when he pressed it with his tongue. "I think mine will come out next week," he said.

"Just as well," Mabel reassured him. "Dad might not want to take us to the zoo if he had to shell out _six_ dollars to the Tooth Fairy."

"I'm not sure that's how it's supposed to work."

"No, I figured it out. It's a service, like garbage pickup. I mean, if the tooth fairy had to pay for every tooth from every kid in the world, it would be like a gazillion dollars. Don't tell me any bank would trust a fairy with that big an account! Besides, I talked to Dad to get us a raise, remember?"

That was a point. When Mabel felt her first baby-tooth wiggle, She had asked their parents how much money the tooth fairy would pay. "Used to be fifty cents when I was your age," Dad said.

"I always got a dollar," Mom said. "Sometimes four quarters, sometimes a bill."

That was interesting, since Grandpa Pines had owned and operated a chain of electronics stores before illness had forced him to sell out. He was well-off, while Grandma Bailey had to struggle to make ends meet.

"I think we should get two dollars per tooth," Mabel said. "Since we're twins."

"Maybe two and a half? Dad had teased.

"What? No! Three dollars or nothing!" Mabel had said.

""Why?"

"The fifty cents would make us want to spend it. I mean, it's just kind of leftover money, OK? And once we started spending the fifty cents, we'd say, oh, well, easy come, easy go, and spend the rest. This way we can spend a dollar and save a dollar for college!"

Perhaps too easily impressed, Alex said, "I'll speak with the tooth fairy."

And Bingo! Sure enough, both Dipper and Mabel had found three dollars under their pillow. The teeth were indubitably gone.

"Nobody ever sees the tooth fairy," Mabel sighed as they went inside the school that Friday morning. "I wish I could."

"Because you love fairies," Dipper said.

"Ha! Because we could overpower her and take away her bag of teeth and not give them back until she paid us a buck each! Hi, Mr. Swenson!"

"Hi, Mr. Swenson," Dipper said. Their former teacher was talking to the principal, but he waved at them. Then to Mabel, Dipper said, "I don't think it's smart to mess around with a fairy that could, you know, rip out all your teeth."

"Good point," she said.

They put up their jackets and caps—Mabel had worn a tam and a girly windbreaker, and Dipper wore his usual green coat and blue watch cap—and then settled in their desks. Dipper had stored his lunchbox in the cubby shelf beneath the coat hooks, but Mabel, as usual, brought hers to her desk.

As Chloe came in and unpacked her books—the desks were the old-fashioned kind with a top that opened up like a lid to reveal a storage compartment—Mabel opened her lunchbox on top of her desk. "I'm all set, Dipper!" she said. "One juice box for morning snack, one to have with lunch, and one I froze so I can have it after school! I'm gonna be so full of juice!"

Dipper didn't have a response to that.

Mabel opened her desk, put her books inside, and—her brother noticed—also the mysterious brown paper bag, though she left her lunchbox on the seat beside her. She closed the desk, set her lunchbox on it, opened it, and took one of the three boxes of apple juice. "Now for a little morning delight—oops. Maybe in a minute. Hey, Dipper, are you gonna call Mom?"

"Why?" Dipper asked. "What for?"

"You don't have your lunch!" Mabel said. "She'll need to drive it in or bring you money for the lunchroom!"

"I—"

"Go look, but I'm telling you!" Mabel insisted.

Dipper returned to the storage cubbies and took his lunchbox out. He opened it and found it was empty. Well, empty of food, anyway. It did contain one of Mabel's smaller stuffed animals (a pink pig).

Mabel met Mrs. Martweiller at the door. "Uh, please may I be excused to use the girls' room? For some reason, I really need to!"

"You have fifteen minutes," Mrs. Martweiller said. "Make it quick, and use the one down this hall. Don't go wandering."

"Yes, thank you! Oh, Dipper, ask her!"

Dipper had rather do about anything else, but did he want to skip lunch? He decided that no, he didn't.

"Ask me what?" Mrs. Martweiller asked.

"Uh, for some reason my lunch didn't get into my lunchbox today. I need to call Mom to find out what to do. May I go use the phone in the office?"

"This isn't like you," his teacher said, but she gave him a signed pass. "Hurry back."

He scooted to the office, showed the secretary the pass, and she punched a button on the desk phone for an outside line and handed him the receiver. He punched in the number of the home phone.

Mom answered it, sounding a little rushed: "Pines residence."

"Uh, Mom," Dipper said, "it's me. Uh, your son. Uh, Dipper. This is crazy, and I don't know how it happened, but I don't have my lunch."

"What? Just a second." He heard her set down the receiver, and then after a few seconds, not just one, she picked up the kitchen extension. "Your sandwich, Thermos of milk, veggie sticks, and apple are in the refrigerator. I know I packed them!'

"Uh, I think maybe Mabel was playing and needed my—no, I don't know that. What should I do?"

"I'll drive it in and leave it in the office for you," Mom said. "I'll put it in a brown bag with your name on it."

"Thanks, Mom," Dipper said.

"You're welcome, but I'll expect you to clean up your room for this. Every day for a week."

""I'll do it," he said. "I promise."

He returned to the classroom and told Mrs. Martweiller the plan. She said, "Try to remind yourself about bringing your lunch every morning."

When he sat in his desk, he noticed the juice box on Mabel's was missing. And her lunchbox seemed to have been moved.

Mabel bounced back in, hopped into her desk, and stashed her lunchbox inside the storage compartment. "That feels better!" she announced, seeming not to notice that her juice box had mysteriously vanished.

Dipper wondered why she was ignoring Chloe, who was sipping a box of Johnny Apple Juice.

However, Mabel didn't make an issue of it, so he didn't either. That morning Mrs. Martweiller appointed him and Mabel as the boy and girl leaders of the day. That didn't mean much—When everyone lined up for lunch, Mabel would lead the class down the hall, and Dipper would be the rear guard, and then on the way back they changed places, and the same for the walk down the hall at recess.

They were going to try to go out on the playground that morning. At the first sneeze, they'd tell Mrs. Martweiller, and she'd take them inside to wait it out, but maybe they could get by without their allergies sidetracking them. The antihistamines did seem to be helping, so . . . .

The day went by. They went down to lunch and came back. Chloe, who was wearing a blue knee-length dress, sat forward in her seat, reading a worksheet with a very short story typed on it and checking off the answers to simple questions about the story. Then Dipper noticed her squirming and looking down. She half stood up to peer at the floor and then look suspiciously under the desk of the kid in front of her. Mabel leaned and pointed, but didn't say anything.

Then Chloe sat down and raised her hand.

Mrs. Martweiller called on her. "What is it, Chloe?"

"Somebody," she s said, "has wet their pants!"

She sat down again, with a disgusted expression.

"Eww," said another kid in the next row over. "It's her!"

"Yuck!" Chloe said, jumping up. "My chair!"

Dipper couldn't help looking. A pool of yellow liquid in the desk chair dripped onto the floor, where a puddle seemed to be spreading. And the back of Chloe's dress was dark, too.

"Ha!" erupted Pinji Chapman, a kid who was bigger than the others because he had been left back a grade. "She peed herself!"

It might be as well to draw the curtain on the scene of Chloe's hot, embarrassed tears. Mrs. Martweiller took her down to the office, comforting her. During Chloe's absence, Mabel quickly reached over to open her desk and retrieve the remaining juice box, the one that had been frozen, which she stowed in her lunchbox.

* * *

At home that evening, Dipper asked, "How'd you do it?"

"Elementary, my dear Dipson!" Mabel said. "I knew Chloe would sneak my apple juice boxes if she had the chance. One of them was frozen solid, so she'd hide that one in her desk. The unfrozen ones were juice. The frozen one was full of water with a few drops of yellow food coloring. Plus some holes I poked into it after it had frozen. The bottoms of our desks have all these holes in them for ventilation or something. As the day went on, the box thawed out and water started to drip through the book compartment and onto the floor."

"But her seat was wet!"

Mabel pointed her finger at him. "Oh, you doubting Dipper!"

"Hey!" a stream of warm water had shot from her finger right into his face. "That better not be—"

"Just water, not even any food dye," she said. "Look!" She reached inside her top and pulled out a tennis-ball-sized rubber bulb, the one that had been connected to the jumping frog toy. She showed Dipper how she had strung the tube down her sleeve. "I had the bulb in my armpit, so when I pointed at the desk, I gave it a squeeze. That shot some into the seat of Chloe's desk, and when she sat down—"

Dipper just stared at his grinning sister. "Mabel," he said at last, "that was really mean."

"I won't do it often," she said. "But look at it like this—Chloe's not ever gonna steal my juice again. And she's not gonna forget this anytime soon. And she may get the idea that somehow I was behind this—but there's no proof, right?"

"I hope you never get mad at me," he said.

"No way! You're my, um, my—my Bro, Bro. My Bro-bro!"

"Well," he said, in that case, I'd like to ask you to do something."

"Fire away!"

* * *

And that is why the next Monday at school Mabel met Chloe at the front door and said, "Hey, you and I got off on the wrong foot. Anybody who teases you today, point 'em out and they'll get the Mabel treatment."

Chloe looked at her, stunned. And then the tears began to fall. "That was so embarrassing!"

"Pshaw," Mabel said, pronouncing the "P." "One day you'll look back on this and laugh about it. And I promise, whenever I bring in a juice box for myself, I'll bring an extra so we can share."

"I'm sorry about putting gum in your hair," Chloe said. "Um—I think the way you fixed it—it looks good, OK?"

"Thanks," Mabel said. "Want to try it? Friends?"

Chloe gave her a feeble, shy smile. "We'll try."

So what if they never became what you'd call besties? Didn't matter. They had fun times on the playground (after allergy season), they traded toys, they checked each other's work, they came to each other's defense—after one crude attempt at making fun of Chloe, even Pinji Chapman let her alone, because Mabel pointed out that he was being a bully, and for a boy in second grade it's just not possible to admit the black eye came from an irritated _girl._

The week of Thanksgiving, Mabel asked her mom if Chloe could come visit them for a sleepover on Friday night. "Where would you sleep?" Mom asked.

"Our room!" Mabel said.

Dipper blushed. "Uh, I could—if you'd let me—I could sleep in the guest room," he said. "For that one night."

"Please please please," Mabel said.

"All right," her mother said with a smile.

"Wait, I haven't finished. Please please please! There. Thank you, Mom!" And she hugged Dipper. "Thank you, Brobro!"

He shrugged and went upstairs. About half a minute later, Mabel followed him there. "Uh—Dipper?"

"Yeah?" he asked. He had pulled a chair up and was leaning on the sill and looking out the window. True, all he could see was their back yard, and beyond that the Chiang family's house and back yard, but he didn't seem interested even in that.

"What's wrong? Is it OK with you if I have a sleepover with Chloe?"

"It's fine," he said. "I'm glad that, you know, you and she are friends now. She'll be a better person for knowing you."

"Yeah, we'll mend that little broken teacup, and it was all your idea," she said, hugging him again. "Thank you again."

She pulled back, and he gave her the saddest smile she had ever seen. "Dipper, what's— oh." The last word was soft, and yet surprised and sorrowful all at once.

Did she have unshed tears standing in her eyes? He blinked. "What?"

She rubbed the back of her hand across her eyes. "Um, Dipper, you—you helped me and stood beside me and still didn't get a friend out of this. And you're sad."

"It's OK," he said, trying to sound normal. "I know I'm not you. I'm just—me." He sighed. "I'm just Dipper. That's all I can ever be."

"Don't be upset," Mabel urged. "One day—one day you'll—I'm gonna—OK, listen up. We're not the same. I get that. But we're kinda alike in so many ways. One day you're gonna have, I don't know, all kinds of friends. Dozens. Or at least some real good, real close ones! That's a Mabel promise."

"Anyway, I've got a wonderful sister," Dipper said, and finally his smile looked genuine.

As it turned out, it took years longer than Mabel expected, but eventually Dipper—

Well, that's another story.

* * *

The End


End file.
